The book deals with the origins of the liturgical year - the feasts, fasts and seasons. It is accessible to the general reader and to students, while being a serious academic text.

Fifty-two stories about the large themes of life, nature and faith. Positive and life-affirming, 52 Original Wisdom Stories follows the liturgical year and is an ideal resource for public worship. Sid and Rosie are an older married couple, with several children and grandchildren. Through a series of short, engaging narratives, we learn about their faith, their feelings for one another, their hopes and dreams, and their perception of how God speaks to them through the events of their lives. Each story stands on its own; their sequence follows the rhythm of the church's year from Advent through Christmas, Easter, Pentecost, and Harvest Thanksgiving. With an open tone of wonder and reflection, author Penelope Wilcock explores the ordinary and extraordinary topics of daily life: falling in love, marriage, birth, education, illness, woodlands, farming, meeting adversity, hospitality, home-making, work. This beautiful book is ideal for personal reflection and growth and as a refreshing resource for church and small group discussions.

* All the most exciting readings - in all three years - come from the Gospel of John

Transform Your Prayer Life in 55 Days. For far too many believers, prayer is a fruitless, frustrating, joyless exercise. They know they ought to do it, but it rarely happens because there is little expectation that it will change anything. There is another way to pray: an exciting, joyous way that brings heaven's power to earth and makes breakthroughs a daily reality. Praying Grace is a 55-day journey of discovery and hope created to: - help your heart absorb the full implications of Jesus' finished work on the cross, - lead you to a deep revelation of God's goodness and faithfulness, - ground your identity in who God says you are, and - model a form of praying that proclaims rather than pleads, making you a true partner with God. Get ready to discover how to pray from victory rather than struggle for victory. Take hold of the power of Praying Grace.

Jesus was a pest to the Romans and a threat to the religious leadership, so they hung him out like so much refuse. Little did they realize that it was like trying to put out a fire with petrol. The whole world exploded. With characteristic style, John Pritchard takes us on pilgrimage to the Holy Land, as he unpacks the five great events that made Christianity - Christmas, Good Friday, Easter, Ascension and Pentecost. We explore: `What happened?' `What did it mean?' `What does it mean for us?' Absorbing, immediate and full of stories, this volume offers deeply considered theology, brilliantly communicated to connect with life as we actually experience it.

Equipping your Messy team to pray and encourage others to do so, both within and outside the Messy Church context - Communicating prayer as a concept - Praying as a team in advance and on the day - Prayer ideas for the activity time, celebration time, and at home as a family - Ways of praying the Lord's Prayer - Ways to reimagine other traditional prayers - Creating a prayer space - A Messy Quiet Day outline

Grow in your relationship with God as you reflect on His many names while reading and writing your way through this beautiful 40-day devotional.

From Alpha to Omega, El Shaddai to Prince of Peace, the many names of God highlight His attributes. All the Glorious Names is a 40-day devotional experience that explores who God is through the meanings of His names. Each of the daily devotionals in this book includes:

• A unique name of God found in the Bible
• The Scripture passage in which the name of God is found
• Meditations on the meaning and message behind each name
• A closing prayer
• Journaling prompts and lined journaling space
• The book also features a listing of every one of the names of God and where they are found in the Bible, allowing you to dive deeper into the Biblical contexts of each. It makes a great gift for a mother, sister, daughter, or wife, and can be used as a group Bible study curriculum for small groups.

All the Glorious Names is an invitation to worship and be full of wonder that God has said “I have called you by name, you are mine” (Isaiah 43:1 RSV)

Though Christians the world over make yearly preparations for Lent, there s a conspicuous lack of good books for that other great spiritual season: Advent. All the same, this four-week period leading up to Christmas is making a comeback as growing numbers reject shopping-mall frenzy and examine the deeper meaning of the season. Ecumenical in scope, these fifty devotions invite the reader to contemplate the great themes of Christmas and the significance that the coming of Jesus has for each of us not only during Advent, but every day. Whether dipped into at leisure or used on a daily basis, Watch for the Light gives the phrase holiday preparations new depth and meaning. Includes writings by Christoph Friedrich Blumhardt, Sylvia Plath, J. B. Phillips, Friedrich Wilhelm Foerster, Henri Nouwen, Bernard of Clairvaux, Kathleen Norris, Meister Eckhart, St. Thomas Aquinas, Karl Rahner, Isaac Penington, Madeleine L Engle, Alfred Delp, Loretta Ross-Gotta, William Stringfellow, J. Heinrich Arnold, Edith Stein, Philip Britts, Jane Kenyon, John Howard Yoder, Emmy Arnold, Karl Barth, Oscar Romero, William Willimon, Johann Christoph Arnold, Gail Godwin, Leonardo Boff, G. M. Hopkins, Evelyn Underhill, Dorothy Day, Brennan Manning, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Romano Guardini, Annie Dillard, Martin Luther, St. John Chrysostom, Giovanni Papini, Dorothee Soelle, C. S. Lewis, Gustavo Gutierrez, Philip Yancey, J. T. Clement, Thomas Merton, Eberhard Arnold, Ernesto Cardenal, T. S. Eliot, John Donne, Gian Carlo Menotti and Jurgen Moltmann."

One of the most wonderful things about walking with God is that we can have an intimate and real relationship with him. He wants us to know him so well that we are comfortable talking to him about anything and everything. Yet, there are times when we feel disconnected and insecure. We desire to grow in prayer, but we don't know where to begin, what to say, or how to listen for his voice.

In She Prays, Debbie Lindell invites you on a 31-day journey to experience a confident and conversational relationship with your heavenly Father. She shows you how to replace the pressure to perform in prayer with a faith-filled expectation--trusting that God is delighted with every conversation and every word we whisper to him. Her desire is that your soul will be transformed as your confidence in prayer grows, and that your faith will be strengthened as you see God work through your prayers in ways you never imagined possible.

Every Prayer Strengthens Your Marriage As a husband, you have a unique set of responsibilities weighing on you each day. Your desire is to provide for your wife-and the very best way you can take care of her is by praying for her and your marriage. Let the Lord lead you step by step, decision by decision, moment by moment as you seek to... mature in your faith build relational confidence and intimacy overcome temptations and trials encourage your wife to be all she can be Discover biblical direction in this collection of prayers and devotions written for busy husbands like you who need a minute of inspiration.

Egeria, who was most probably a Spanish nun, visited the Holy Land only fifty years after the death of Constantine, making her work the earliest surviving account of the area. Her description of the Holy Land, particularly that of Jerusalem, are written with a loving attention to detail, making her the prime source of early Christian pilgrimage and worship. The third edition of John Wilkinson's well-known book is completely updated and as well as a translation of Egeria's account, includes a wealth of information about Egeria, her journey and early liturgy.

This is the first comprehensive and up-to-date account of the internal arrangement of church buildings in Western Europe between 1500 and 2000, showing how these arrangements have met the liturgical needs of their respective denominations, Catholic and Protestant, over this period. In addition to a chapter looking at the general impact of the Reformation on church buildings, there are separate chapters on the churches of the Lutheran, Reformed, Anglican and Roman Catholic traditions between the mid-sixteenth and mid-nineteenth centuries, and on the ecclesiological movement of the nineteenth century and the liturgical movement of the twentieth century, both of which have impacted on all the churches of Western Europe over the past 150 years. The book is extensively illustrated with figures in the text and a series of plates and also contains comprehensive guides to both further reading and buildings to visit throughout Western Europe.

Will the Christian church live or die? What is the way ahead? Answering these questions, this book challenges all people of God to seek unity in and beyond the norms of dogma and hierarchy.